“I’m pumped about this book because I believe that children’s ministry has too often taken a back seat when it comes to leadership. It’s good to see children’s ministers taking the step to write about leadership.” Mark Williams

One of the things I like so much about The Eric Trap is the fact it’s a leadership book written by kids pastors that speaks to every staff position in the church. I believe that The Eric Trap will not be the last leadership book written by a kids pastor for the larger church context. There are many things I have learned in the trenches of Kids ministry that I see as lacking or non existant in Adult ministry. One of the things that I have learned from The Eric Trap is that kids pastors need to stop focusing all their leadership lessons and knowledge on just the kidmin community.

Why don’t more kids pastors speak up? The main reason that more kids pastors don’t speak up is they are so intrenched in the week to week of ministry they don’t have the time or the energy to speak up. The other reason I think kids pastor’s don’t speak up more on the topic of leadership is because we lead apolitically far to much. There are leadership development principles that the church needs to learn that many kids pastors take for granted.

So kids pastor, youth pastor, worship pastor let God dig deep in you so you can be a resource for the growth of the Kingdom and the establishment of the Gospel. Leadership matters. So don’t be like Eric lead boldly because of who Christ is and what He has done not because of who you are or what you have done.

Here’s the deal the good folks at Zonervan are doing a REtweet contest. They are giving away four copies of The Jesus Storybook Bible curriculum. I only need one copy for our church so if I win you win. Even if you don’t use the curriculum you will get 44 videos one for each story they are incredible.

How I’ll do this contest for an amazing resource is the 3 people who RT the following tweet the most will win a copy if I do.

“RT @samluce Zonderkidz is releasing a new amazing resource based on The Jesus Storybook Bible #jsbcurriculum”

Have you ever read a great book that references another book and always want to read the book referenced but always forget what that book was called and never get around to reading it? Yeah me too. I was reading a book by Gladwell and he referenced “The Checklist Manifesto” and how checklists had been used by surgeons to lower the death rate in hospitals by over 60%. I was intrigued and made a mental note to follow up and read that book and for the first time I think ever I followed up on a book within a book.

Every person who leads should read this book especially if you are leading in either a complex or a stressful environment. I believe this book has huge implications for kids ministry and leadership in general. If you could reproduce yourself quicker with more mesurable results wouldn’t you? The check list has a place in church ministry. If we are in a place where we have to innovate to keep balls from being dropped. Checklists are an option, why? Because they externalize structure.

If you are doing a task that requires repetitiveness in any form you need a checklist or you are going to forget the importnat stuff. For example Check-in people turn the computer on, check the name tag printer, check the intake forms, SMILE. If we don’t see the check box for smile we could forget that our job is about people not computers. My mind is still spinning with the possibilities of how I can begin to use checklists in a way that helps us as a church automate tasks so we can focus on people and not worry about the small stuff. Let the checklist take care of that.

Here are a couple quotes from the book:

“We need a different strategy for overcoming failure, one that builds on experience and takes advantage of the knowledge people have but somehow also makes up for our inevitable human inadequacies. And there is such a strategy- though it will seem almost ridiculous in its simplicity, maybe even crazy to those of us who have spent years carefully developing ever more advanced skills and technologies. It is a checklist.”

“The biggest cause of serious error in this business is a failure of communication”

“The philosophy is that you push the power of decision making out to the periphery and away from the center. You give people the room to adapt, based on their experience and expertise. All you ask is that they talk to one another and take responsibility.”

Lee Scott Walmart CEO to his company regarding Hurricane Katrina “This company will respond to the level of this disaster, a lot of you are going to have to make decisions about your level. Make the best decision that you can with the information that’s available to you at the time, and, above all, do the right thing.”

“If the American government had responded like Wal-Mart has responded, we wouldn’t be in this crisis.” Jefferson Parish’s top official, Aaron Broussard

“I came away from Katrina with a kind of theory: under conditions of complexity, not only are checklists a help, they are required for success. There must always be room for judgment, but judgement aided – and enhanced – by procedure.”

“There are good checklists and bad. Bad checklists are vague and imprecise. They are too long; they are hard to use; they are impractical. They are made by desk jockeys with no awareness of the situations in which they are to be deployed. They treat the people using the tools as dumb and try to spell out every single step. They turn people’s brains off rather than turn them on.”

“Good checklists, on the other hand, are precise. They are efficient, to the point, and easy to use even in the most difficult situations. They do not try to spell out everything – a checklist cannot fly a plane. Instead, they provide reminders of only the most critical and important steps- the ones that even the highly skilled professionals using them could miss. Good checklists are, above all, practical.”

“When we look closely, we recognize the same balls being dropped over and over, even by those of great ability and determination. We know the patterns. We see the costs. It’s time to try something else. Try a checklist.”

My last post was about keeping kids safe online but dealt more with computer based safety. The web is moving more and more towards mobile devices every year. From ipods to nintendo dsi’s, when you hand your child an internet enabled device without proper boundaries you are foolish.

52% of nine year olds and 95% of 15 year olds have a mobile phone

By 2020 most of us will connect to the internet via our mobile devices

Mobile internet Tips for parents

Create a Parent / Child Acceptable Use Contract

Phones remain in kitchen at night to charge

Review phone logs at random, look for gaps in time

Get a paper bill and review the numbers called and texts sent

Get a web filter for your child’s mobile device.

Have family rules for daily, monthly and yearly mobile free times.

Have a zero tolerance policy for texting and driving.

Here are a couple of mobile software sites you need to take a look at.

Screen SMS messages

Photo and video monitoring
Records photos and videos taken by the phone.

One of the push backs many parents and EVERY kid will have is this what about privacy. My kids will not have any privacy there are just to many dangers out there with mobile technology. If my kids get upset over monitoring software on their phone I’ll remind them they are lucky they have a door to their room. Parents if your kid has a cell phone don’t trust them, protect them.

One of the posts I like to do from time to time is a post on keeping kids safe online. The internet is an incredible tool but it can and has done incredible damage. One of the most dangerous and most helpful characteristics of parents is they always believe the best in their kids. It’s dangerous because we overlook obvious warning signs because “our kids would never do that”. Our hearts tell us our kids would never see stuff or be pulled into stuff on-line but statistics tell us different.

Here are a few statistics about online safety and kids from enough.org

K-1st grade students access the Internet using various devices for a variety of purposes, including playing online games and communicating with other people. Online gaming is increasingly popular among younger students. (Rochester Institute of Technology, 2008)

48 percent of students K-1st grade level interact with people on Web sites, while 50 percent show that their parents watch them when they use a computer, leaving the other half of those youngsters more prone to being exposed to predation behaviors or other threats posed by online strangers or even persons they know or regard as friends. (Rochester Institute of Technology, 2008)

48 percent of K-1st reported viewing online content that made them feel uncomfortable, of which 72 percent reported the experience to a grownup, meaning that one in four children did not. (Rochester Institute of Technology, 2008)

32 percent of teens clear the browser history to hide what they do online from their parents. (Harris Interactive-McAfee 10/2008)

16 percent have created private e-mail addresses or social networking profiles to hide what they do online from their parents. (Harris Interactive-McAfee 10/2008)

63 percent of teens said they know how to hide what they do online from their parents. (Harris Interactive-McAfee 10/2008)

43 percent have closed or minimized the browser at the sound of a parental step. (Harris Interactive-McAfee 10/2008)

About Me

My name is Sam Luce and I have been the children’s pastor at Redeemer Church in Utica NY for the past 18 years. Currently I am serving as the Pastor of families for all our campuses. This is my personal blog it is focused on leadership, children's ministry and creativity.